Perfectly Damaged
by Winter Ashby
Summary: A chance meeting and shared regret bring two unlikely people together for a chance at unexpected forgiveness. [Roy & Winry] Takes place after the series and movie.
1. Equivalent Trade

**Title**: Perfectly Damaged  
**Author**: Winter Ashby (_rosweldrmr_)  
**Disclaimer**: Fullmetal Alchemist belongs to Hiromu Arakawa-sama, not me!  
**Warnings**: The uncensored version of Chapter 2 that is posted at my livejournal account is NC-17. But if you're not into that, then the one here works just as well.  
**Summary**: A chance meeting and shared regret bring two unlikely people together for a chance at unexpected forgiveness. Roy & Winry Takes place after the series and movie.  
**Timeline**: this takes place after the series and movie - both have happened, so, you know: SPOLIERS! This does not follow the manga - one of those will be coming soon._**  
**Chapter 1_: Equivalent Trade - A year after Ed and Al leave her world forever, Winry finds herself under Central. But she's not alone in her silent vigil anymore, and she's the only one who can free him from the prision of guilt he's surrounded himself with.  
**Author's Notes**: This is for **SE **for being such a pal! Edited and uploaded just in time for Thursday! And now, no citrus of any kind. It's not my best work, I know this. But I hope you enjoy it anyway :) Thank you... and enjoy.

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It had been a year since Ed and Al left Winry's life for good. Before, when Ed was gone, she dreamt of him on sun kissed days, smiling and laughing like he used to. But now that she knew he was really gone, her dreams turned to vengeful nightmares about all the people who had been taken from her in her short lifetime. She was eighteen now, and ready to leave the small village that she had called home for so many years. It no longer held happy memories of days gone by, but pitiful regret for all that she let be taken from her. She would cry at night and chastise herself for not trying harder to go with Ed and Al to the other side of the gate. Part of her knew how absurd the thought of actually making it alive was, but she still couldn't stop wishing that she wasn't so alone. Sure she had made friends over the past five years, but there was no one anymore to take Ed's place in her dreams. So she stopped dreaming, she stopped hoping that somehow he would come back to her. 

She left Rezembool and made her way to Central. The place where she last saw them, the place where she was almost killed when she was thirteen, and the place where the last of her remaining friends were. Glacier took her in for a few months before she found and job and got enough money to move out on her own. Elysia was harder to leave than she thought she would be, but the beckoning loneliness that solitude granted her called her home.

Home was small, damp, dark and in a very remote part of town. It was dangerous, and part of her liked that thought. The first time she twisted the key in the lock and let the ugly door slide open, she wished Ed could see her from out there somewhere and was furious at her for living somewhere so unsafe. She hoped that he stayed up and night and worried about her. But she knew how crazy that was. She worked in an auto-mail shop in town that her grandmother told her about. It was easy, familiar work. But without the possibility of seeing Ed ever again, it just didn't seem as important anymore. Sometimes, she caught herself trying to calculate how much he would have grown so that she could make adjustments to the arm and leg that she still kept in her closet. It was a morbid obsession, but one that kept her going.

It was now the two year anniversary of Ed and Al's departure. And while she tried not to think about how empty she felt, she went to work and cried at her lunch break. After her shift was over, she left with every intention of going home and crying some more in loneliness. But she felt drawn to the underground city. It had long since been closed and under the new military control. No one was allowed in, but luckily for her the new parliament hadn't been as strict as the previous ruler and there was no one on duty. So she quietly made her way to the last place she saw her lifelong friends and crashed to the ground in a thunderous act of aggression.

"Why, why did you leave me here all alone? Why didn't you take me with you? Even death couldn't be as bad as living in absolute desolation! How could you abandon me like that, without even saying goodbye?" she screamed through teary, stinging eyes as she slammed her tiny fists onto the old cobblestone streets. Her tears slipped past her eyes and came crashing down with violent hatred. She knew she shouldn't be mad, but she wanted to blame someone, and since they were gone it was easier to be mad than accept that they did what had to be done.

Once her heart stopped pounding in her ears, she was aware that there were long, echoing footsteps in the distance. And for one shinning moment, she convinced herself that it was Ed. But as she dusted her knees and stood, there was a deep blue uniform in the distance. Through the haze of her own tears, even she couldn't deny the raven hair and a single, narrow, black eye.

So for the second time in her short life, that same face single-handedly took away her hope. There wasn't a hint of gold in that distant figure, and the weight of the past nineteen years of disappointment, regret, loneliness, and pain came crashing over her. She was alone, just like she always had been. And the ground was suddenly rushing up at her faster than she could react to. Instead she let the pain of the cold ground smashing against her face sooth the pain of her heart. The tears fell freely and without effort anymore. She was sobbing so hard, it was difficult to breathe, and for a moment she thought that she might die; and to her horror that idea was a welcome reprieve.

"His last words to me and Al were to tell you thank you for the auto-mail." A thick voice intruded her thoughts and left a ringing sensation of familiarity. But she didn't acknowledge the voice; she pretended that she was still alone, in her fortress of bitter envy for everything that was taken from her. She cried harder because she couldn't stop the echoing voice of her parent's murderer and Ed's ally. It was his voice that brought her the much needed finality to this whole saga. She knew they weren't coming back, but crying and letting the cold stone comfort her was the only way she knew how to keep breathing.

"I love him." She screamed into her balled fists with heartbreaking vulnerability. "I loved him." She whispered it again and again until her voice was so soft; she wasn't sure if she was saying it in her own head or if it was still out loud. But that didn't matter, because she was alone now. She was going to be alone forever, and no matter how many times she yelled at herself for being so selfish – she couldn't stop the anger she held for him.

It was some time before the tears stopped. But even then, she lay on the street of an abandoned city and waited for oblivion to come. She wasn't sure if she had imagined the voice a while ago, or if he had left. But she began to feel the cold chill of the frozen air seep through her light dress. And the ache in her fists beckoned attention. So finally, after all the will power she had was sucked away into the void of a deserted city, she slowly pushed herself into a sitting position. She didn't bother to turn around, but she could hear his breathing. She didn't care why he was there, or if he stayed, or even that he'd seen her at her worst. All she was aware of at that moment was the blood that oozed from her knuckles and stained her clothes.

She stared at her hands in disbelief. She didn't even remember punching the ground. It is such a vulgar move, something she would have expected Ed to do when he was frustrated. But then again, she was rougher that she cared to admit. She watched as the blood ran down her hands and into her lap. Winry was, for the first time in her life, broken. Something in her was now shattered and she knew that nothing in the world could ever fix her.

"Equivalent Trade..." she bitterly spat as she watched the pain that she felt materialized on her body. "What a load of crap."

It wasn't until that moment that the infamous flame alchemist felt any affinity towards the young, broken girl sitting in the street. But with that one moment, he was irreversibly linked to her; because she shared his contempt for the blasphemous skill of alchemy. The law of equivalent trade that he had based his entire life on was in fact a load of crap. He looked down at her bleeding hands and broken heart and felt compelled to ease her pain.

It was at that moment that she turned to him, eyes still full of un-cried tears and spoke to him. "What did I get, what was my trade? I've lost almost everyone I've ever loved, where is my equivalent trade? Where is my happy ending?"

Roy Mustang took a step forward, hesitantly, and tried to keep his last remaining eye clear of the stinging, hazy sensation that accompanies very un-mainly tears. But to his dismay, the girl at his feet was beginning to blur because she finally said what had been in his heart for years. He had taken so much, he was part of the reason that this girl was laying broken in the street. He had taken countless lives, and seen so many others split apart because of him. He had taken other men's women, and all the while pretended to ignore the love that Riza Hawkeye held for him. Where was his equal trade, where was the horrible fate that should have been waiting for him around ever corner? He had been waiting for the day when someone would take his life in return. But that day never came.

When he moved to the country, he knew that Riza wouldn't follow him anymore. Despite the slight reprieve in his alchemy abstinence when he once again fought by her side, he knew that it was only temporary. When the battle was over and the snowy village called him home – she couldn't go with him. She had completed her duty to protect him. And he honestly wished her happiness with the man he had taken so many women from. Armstrong was the one who told him of Havoc and Riza's impending nuptials. It seemed fitting that Havoc get the one girl that he never sullied.

So now it was the solitude of his country cottage that kept him moving each day. It was the constant wait for the end that made him not pull the trigger. Well, the wait, and his own cowardly fear. He had killed without question in Ishabal, and yet he still wasn't able to pull the trigger on the one life that deserved to be taken. His own.

But in the midst of his own thought he found his way to the street next to the young girl he helped to break. He looked at her and saw the embodiment of all his sins. He was the man who took away this girl's parents and then helped to recruit the man she loved. He had stolen her last remaining chance at happiness.

"I took it." He whispered quietly to the frozen air by her side. He was faintly aware of her warm arm brushing against his uniform but the thought that he had taken her joy ripped the air from his lungs and filled his heart with fears and self hate that even he hadn't achieved yet.

"What?" she asked from his left, soggy face upturned in fearful apprehension. For a moment he wasn't sure what happened. He hadn't thought he spoke out loud. But her painful voice told him everything he needed to know.

He closed his remaining eye, trying to keep his own tears at bay while he confessed his evil sins to her. "You asked where your happy ending went." He paused and took in a long, ragged breath. "I took it. I am the reason that you are alone and heartbroken. I took your…" his words caught in his throat as he tried to speak. "… I'm the reason you are an orphan. I'm the reason Ed became a Nationally Certified Alchemist. I couldn't stop him from leaving. I didn't even try…" it was then that the tears began to fall. The thought of Hughes' family, Ed and Al leaving; the memory of Ed detaching the plane wing while he drifted farther away, and all he could do was help Al jump across. "I helped Al leave… I helped him…"

So it was there, on that street, in the presence of that girl he had broken that his own heart split into pieces. He hadn't let himself grieve for the loss of the boys who he had come to love yet. But he couldn't hide it anymore. Watching Ed and Al fly off to the gate that he could never possibly survive was one of the hardest things he ever did. "I wanted to stop them, I wanted to bring them back!" he screamed into his palms.

He was lost in the void of tears, regret and hatred when a warm, small hand grasped his from in front of his face and brought in down. He slowly opened his eye to see blue eyes and blond hair giving him an equally shattered look. He looked down at his own hand wrapped in her bloody ones, resting in her lap.

"Roy," she tilted her head to the side and examined his stone features. It was as if she was gauging what to say next or maybe she was just adjusting to the idea of saying his name without malice. Because the truth was, that no matter how many times she tried to forgive him in the past, tried to see the good in him, what Hughes died for, what Riza tried to protect; every time she said his name it came out laced with contempt. But this time was different, this time she looked right into his mournful, angry eyes and felt a swell of companionship and pity for him. "…you didn't take my happy ending. Ed was just doing what he thought was right, like he always does. You couldn't have stopped him, or Al. They're all grown up now, and… and…" her own tears threatened to spill out as she tried to comfort the man that had just confessed to ruining her life. "… Ed would have done alchemy regardless of your visit. You kept him safe all those years, you looked after him when I couldn't." she finished slowly and honestly.

His eyes slinked to the left and right, trying desperately to not have to look her in the eyes. So she gently lifted her hand to his chin. She felt the slight stubble of a day's long train ride from his new home into the city, and the cold of being without his fire for two years more. She pulled his face until he had no choice but to look her in the eye. "I know why you are here today," she spoke quietly and full of all the truth that she could hold. "... I know your pain, and your guilt. And I am the only person in the world who can say this to you." She paused and let him soak in what she had said. "Listen carefully, because I'm only going to say this once." She stopped once more before she finally gave him what he deserved. "Roy Mustang, you are forgiven." Her gentle voice slowly said each word to his widening eye.

With that one gesture, he was finally free of all the pain he felt when he looked at her. He could feel all the pent up self-hatred beginning to ebb away. She soothed away all his guilt and shame. But her faith in him sent his last remaining shred of self control tumbling over the edge into misery. He collapsed into her arms and cried like a child who lost his parents and cried harder at the thought of the irony of that analogy. His ungloved hands grasped the thin fabric of her dress and balled it into fists.

"How can you forgive me?" he sobbed into her chest as she shifted her position of let him be completely enveloped in her arms. She didn't respond, but slowly rubbed his back with bloody hands and whispered soft words of encouraging forgiveness into his ear. She ran her fingers through his hair and let him cry because she knew that he had not been able to, and probably wouldn't allow himself to do it again.

"You are a good man, Roy." She whispered over and over again into the air that surrounded them in their combined solitude. And after a while of sitting there like that, he finally pried himself from her arms and looked her in the eyes, willingly, for the first time in his life. "I know why you really came to Rezembool all those years ago. You have been forgiven from that day by the river when you were chasing Ed and Al." she gave him a small, half smile. It was a kind gesture, but he could tell that it didn't reach her eyes.

Still vulnerable and self-conscience, he began to stand. He winced slightly as he rested his weight on his leg. Even after four years, it still hurt some times. Winry followed his example and stood next to him and looked to the roof of the cavern. It was still hard to believe that they were gone for good. But in her misery, she was surprised to find that she didn't feel quite as lonely anymore.

She slid her arm around his as they started to make their way toward the exit. She felt like she was standing at the edge of something very important, but she hadn't quite reached it yet. She didn't say a word as he carefully led her from the abandoned city under the city and made their way back to the streets of Central. She absentmindedly twirled her fingers in the rough fabric of his police uniform as they walked in silence through the city.

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The second half of this is located on my livejournal page (because it's lemony).

rosweldrmr. livejournal. com / 694.html

There is a link on my profile if you want.


	2. Perfectly Damaged

**Title**: Perfectly Damaged  
**Author**: Winter Ashby (_rosweldrmr_)  
**Disclaimer**: Fullmetal Alchemist belongs to Hiromu Arakawa-sama, not me!  
**Warnings**: The uncensored version of Chapter 2 that is posted at my livejournal account is NC-17. But if you're not into that, then the one here works just as well.  
**Summary**: A chance meeting and shared regret bring two unlikely people together for a chance at unexpected forgiveness. Roy & Winry Takes place after the series and movie.  
**Timeline**: this takes place after the series and movie - both have happened, so, you know: SPOLIERS! This does not follow the manga - one of those will be coming soon._**  
**Chapter 2_: Perfectly Damaged - Winry takes Roy back to her apartment to rest, but soon realizes that it was a mistake. Because she's never had a man in her home, who looked at her like that before. She wishes she didn't ... but she wants him, because he's real and painfully similar.  
**Authors Notes**: Oh-my-frickin-goodness, It's been soooooooo ridiculously long since I first started this. Holy crapper… anywho… it's FINALLY done. And that's all that matters. Why doesn't anyone like Roy & Winry! If people can like Kakashi & Sakura and Sesshoumaru & Rin, why in the flippin' hello can't people just give this pairing a chance? I mean, the angst alone is just unbelievable! Perfect, I tell you! Oh well, that was my rant. I'm done now. Oh, I'm so depressed. Poop! Fudge it, I hope those you who DO read this enjoy it!

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She hadn't realized how long they had been down there until the amber hue started to rise in the east. The dawn was on the horizon, and she had spent the night mourning for all that she would never regain with a kindred soul of the strangest sort. Wordlessly, and effortlessly she guided him down the now familiar, dangerous streets to her apartment. He stayed quiet as she pulled the chain from around her neck and lifted it over her head, revealing a key. She turned it in the lock and walked over the threshold of her own little torture chamber. She didn't turn to watch him enter, she knew he would. After all, he had no where else to go.

She threw the key on the counter and felt through the dissipating darkness for the light switch. Once there was light enough to see, she gestured toward the couch and gave him a weak smile. "Goodnight." She addressed him quietly and left him to do what he wanted. It was the shower that she was more interested in.

She turned the knob to all the way hot and waited for the steam to build up to a palatable mist before she de-robed and stepped into the boiling spray. She closed her eyes expectantly and let the steaming water was over her and down the drain. She stood there for a long time, just thinking about everything that had just happened. Roy Mustang was in her house, sleeping on her couch. Even as a younger girl, before she knew his connection to her past, she had seen the appeal of a man like him. Even with his bad reputation, she always knew there was more to him than he let on.

As she lathered her soft, cool skin with a rosy body wash, she thought more about her long, convoluted history with him. He was always something of an enigma. When she was taken in Central when she was younger and watch Ed fight to save her, she had watched the way he looked at Ed protectively. There was something in his sarcastic remarks that Ed had found endearing, but she missed it. Then after she discovered what he had done to her parents, she swore to get revenge. But it was Glacier's words and the eerie smiling face of the late Hughes with his arm around him that made her grudgingly accept that vengeance was not an option.

When she was done showering and all the hot water was gone, she turned the faucet off and stepped out of the shower. She was resigned to not think too much about the idea that there was a man in her apartment and she was now dripping and naked. She had saved herself for Ed all those years, only to be left all alone and unfulfilled. She knew it was wrong to think like that, but Mustang used to be known as quite a ladies man. But in the events since that night at King Bradley's house, something profound had changed in him. She knew that Riza was marring Havoc soon, and Roy was all alone out in the middle of nowhere.

Roy sat on the couch and rubbed his itchy hands together for the millionth time since he'd sat down. It felt wrong for him to be in her house, on her couch, listening to her shower, trying not to imagine the water running down her skin. He shook his head and stood. He thought about leaving several times, but the truth was, he had no where else to go. He had only planned on going to the underground city to say his last goodbyes to Ed and Al before he caught the last train back to his home. But from the moment that he saw her lying on the street sobbing her eyes out, screaming for finality, equal trade and love that he understood that there was someone out there suffering just as much as he was.

He looked around the tiny living room in the early morning sun. There were tools and various auto-mail parts littered all over the counters, floor, and tables. He was sure that his home looked much the same, scattered with papers about the gate, and all the information he could gather about the people who had invaded their world. It was an obsession like he hadn't displayed since after Ishabal.

It was the sound of the bathroom door opening that caught his attention. He stood in the hall, examining the devastating pictures on her wall at various ages, surrounded by less and less of the people she loved as time went on. It was like a testament to the passing of time and what had been taken from her. He thought that he couldn't remember anything at that moment that seemed anymore depressing than that sight. When he lifted his heavy eye toward the end of the hall, his breath caught in his throat.

She emerged in an orange towel wrapped around her waist, showing legs that extended into his imagination, and the glistening cleavage of one of the most beautiful women he'd ever laid eyes on. He turned quickly back the pictures on the wall, angry at himself for his own curiosity. But the thought of her post-shower/bedroom-bound was not easily dissipated from his mind, even in the face of the same photos that only a moment ago was near to bringing him to tears. He felt as if he were a man at all the wrong moments in life.

She smirked as she left the bathroom and saw his eyes widen. Apparently it had been quite a while since he was the Casanova he used to be. Part of her enjoyed the idea of being desired; while the other was sickly aware of the age difference. He quickly turned away, back to the pictures on her wall, so she slipped into her bedroom, thankful for the inch and a half of solid wood between her naked skin and the fresh memory of his burning gaze.

As soon as the door closed, he began to chastise himself for letting the stupid man in him come out in her presence. She was just a girl, after all. He thought back to a few hours ago, when he was laying his head on her breasts, crying like a little boy. How did he end up here, at Winry Rockbell's apartment in Central City? He mused on that notion for a moment but the sound of sharp intake of breath just beyond the door, and the hushed, "ow" that caught his attention. He thought back to her bloody, swollen knuckles and he couldn't just stand there anymore. He had done nothing but watch while she was in pain, and then he cried all over her.

There was a slight knock on the door, and she knew he had heard her. Her hands were bruised, and she thought she might have even broken a knuckle or two. Still towel-clad and dripping she opened the door and tiredly leaned into the door jam.

"I'm fine." She answered unsolicited. But his unconvinced look beckoned her hands. She lifted them for his inspection regardless of his request and waited patiently so he could confirm what she already knew.

"This one might be broken." He concluded and then made the devastating mistake of looking directly into her eyes. He stood, frozen in her gaze. He couldn't move, or drop her hands. Her deep blue eyes were entrancing, and seemed to be calling to him, begging him to be a man. It had been too many years since he held a woman in his arms, and almost as long as he had wanted to. But standing there, at the precipice of her bedroom, he felt the urge stronger than he ever had. Something about the smell of roses, the unmade bed, and the rising sun made him nearly lean into her and taste her pink lips.

She watched in fixated interest as a moment of paralyzing fear danced through his eye as he stood there holding her hands and staring at her lips. Without a thought as to what the action would do, she delicately, slowly licked her lips. It was an unconscious reaction to the prospect of kissing a man.

As soon as he saw her tongue languidly slide across her lips, he knew he was in deep trouble. He immediately dropped her hands and backed away from the door. This girl was fragile, broken, because of him. He killed her parents; he was more than 10 years older than she was. Even though he repeated all of these perfectly acceptable reasons why he had to leave that instant, it didn't make a difference; because the look in her eyes as she stood inches from him told him everything he needed to know. He would not take advantage of this girl, he was stronger than that. He was the Flame Alchemist, he could control the most volatile element in the world, and he would not be done in by soft pink lips and the sheen of her own saliva. He was more powerful than roses and unmade beds.

As he backed away from her, the horrified look on his expressions was easy to read. "I'm going to get some sleep." He quietly commented as his back turned to her, and she silently cursed her luck. It had been two years since Ed was really gone, and not once had she looked at another man as anything other than a stranger. But this one-eyed mess walked into her life and a few hours later she was thinking about what he would taste like in the shower and disappointed as he walked away from her bedroom.

He's a womanizer. He's more than 10 years older than you, he killed your parents. He is the only person in the world who has seen you breakdown. When he looks at you all he sees are his past mistakes. Your face haunts him; you don't belong anywhere near him. She reprimanded herself over and over as she sighed heavily and slowly closed her door. The coming morning was already here, and something about the rising sun made her feel more tired than she could ever recall feeling. Her soft bed was calling to her, and she followed, towel and all.

Her pillow was warm, but her hair was wet so she lay on her back and drifted off into a dreamless slumber. While out in her living room, he was having a very hard time justifying staying to himself. But he was tired, and he was grateful for the hospitality and companionship that she had so freely offered to him. He knew he couldn't just leave, but he also knew that he'd almost crossed the line. So he made a promise to himself to never let it get that far again, and lay down on the soft couch and slipped into sleep.

It wasn't until the sound of unmistakably loud snoring woke her that Winry remembered that there was someone else in her apartment. She grudgingly rolled over in bed and sat up. Her head was killing her, crying that much usually gave her unbearable headaches. But Roy's snoring wasn't helping the matter. So she stood, and walked out to the living room to inspect the sleeping man closer.

She kneeled on the floor next to the couch and lightly brushed her fingertips over the side of his face. His snoring stopped, and he looked much more peaceful in his sleep than she could ever remember him being. So she sat there, watching his face twist into different emotions and wondered what his mind held. She didn't know what had possessed her to do it, but something about his absolute vulnerability at that moment made her want to touch him. She told herself that she just wanted to make sure that he didn't start snoring again. But for whatever reason, she reached up her hand slid it through his soft, black hair.

She noted that it wasn't like Ed's. When he let her braid it, it was always so thick. But his was thin and passed through her fingers like silk. Maybe it was living in the cold that made it so soft, she didn't know. But she was sure that as soon as she touched him, she was sorry for it. She told herself that she was twisted, but there was a little part of her that wanted him. Because he was there, because he was in just as much pain as she was, because he was alone, because she was a woman and he was a man, and god forgive her, but because he was so handsome it made her heart hurt.

She leaned in slowly, just to get a closer look at his peaceful face at the moment. She told herself it was just to make sure that he was okay, just to check that he was sleeping peacefully. But for all the reasons she could think of, nothing quite justified what she was about to do. With her hand still laced in his hair, she leaned down and place a light kiss on his forehead where so often were worry lines. She knew she shouldn't, she could think of a hundred reasons why, none was less apparent at that moment as she was still in her towel. But she did it anyway. She let her lips brush against his warm skim and wondered for the millionth time that night why it felt so natural to be near him.

But she knew she was playing a dangerous game, one that he probably would disapprove of. So she inched her way back from his face, still entranced at the idea of him in her house, on her couch. She didn't even notice the hand that had risen in her retreat until he grasped hold of her bare arm. It was then that his jet-black eye opened, and she realized she'd gone too far.

He was confused, he could smell the roses in his dreams, and feel soft lips against his skin. He opened his eyes to see the orange towel and blue eyes, as clear as crystals looking at him with mild apprehension. "Wha…" his voice was thick, and so close to her that she felt the shivers run through her as his breath passed over her face.

"You were snoring." She whispered so softly that he almost didn't hear her, even from the six inches that separated them. Then she tilted her head, smiled and touched his hair. This had to be a dream; there was no way that this was happening to him. It had to be a dream, and that's why her touching his hair felt so right. It had been so long since he'd had any contact with another person, he was dreaming about the last person on earth he should be imagining this way.

She was so close that he could feel her towel on his arm. He was almost positive that he'd never wanted something more than he did at that moment. He slid his hand up her soft skin and cupped her neck. She closed her eyes, and he could feel her shiver under his touch; which only made him want her more. He pulled her face down to meet his, fully expecting to wake up any moment, when her breath on his face, the warmth of her skin, the smell of her shampoo, her messy hair all signaled a huge mistake.

"No." the sound left his lips quietly, but with the intended effect. Winry was suddenly very confused as to how she came to be clasped in his hands, just inches from his lips. But the feeling of his breath passing over her lips, tickling her face made her rethink her towel. "Why are you here?" his tone was deep, and slightly intense. Winry thought that it was the first time since she'd known him that she could have actually pictured him with a gun in his hand standing over her parents.

She pulled away, "I told you, you were snoring. And I have a headache, try and keep it down." She stood and retreated quickly to her room where she could sit and think about the implications of her recent actions. Maybe it was her lack of sleep in the past months, her complete devastation at the knowledge of Ed's last words in this world, or maybe it was just having a man in her home that made her abandon all thought, but she was sure that if he stayed any longer, she was going to do something that she would regret.

He sucked in a deep breath of cool air as her form retreated to her sanctuary. He wasn't sure what had happened, but he was sure that he was a fraction of a second away from completely destroying the last shred of morality that he clung to. He was sure if Riza was here, she would have shot him in the leg. And he wouldn't have objected. So he sat up, and removed his eye patch and set it on the table. He rubbed his hands over his weary face and sighed at the thought of what the future implications were to being that close her. He hated himself because of it, but he knew that if he stayed any longer, he would do something he wouldn't be able to take back.

Even with all the mistakes and problems that having him around for the last day had proven, she was sill grateful for the companionship of another person. Knowing that he was in pain also lessened her own, which she recognized as sick and wrong but nonetheless, it was there and real. And he was real. A real living, breathing person who shared in her pain, and looked at her lips with the kind of want she had always dreamed of from another alchemist. She grudgingly admitted to herself as she changed into a pair of shorts and a shirt that she, Winry Rockbell, the auto-mail mechanic, liked the idea that she was wanted. Being so unfamiliar with that notion, she was even more surprised to find that inside her own thoughts, she wanted him too.

She sighed heavily at the idea of wanting anything. She should have been horrified at the thought of kissing Roy Mustang, but quite the opposite, something felt like it was waking up in her for the first time. With Ed it had been different, he was still so young when he was taken the first time, and she had to admit that since the second time she lost him through the gate, she had dreamed of all kinds of inappropriate things she could have done with him. But now it was completely different. She wasn't dreaming about her first love, she was lusting after a real, flesh and blood man who was sitting on her couch. It would be so easy to just stand up and walk out there and ask him to kiss her. Or she could just kiss him.

Winry sighed again, and shook her head. She was going insane, that was the only explanation for everything swimming around in her head. Frustrated, she hit her pillow, and immediately regretted it. Even against the soft fabric the scrapping against her newly acquired scabs was an unpleasant sensation. She fell back into bed and covered her face with her pillow. It was going to take a while for her to get back to sleep, especially because she still had a headache.

Roy was sure he'd heard a wince of pain from down the hall, and even as much as he wanted to move, the thought of facing that bedroom again wasn't something he could handle. She was soft, he mused to himself as he rubbed the fingers of his hand together that had touched her skin. She was softer than he had expected, like water running over marble. And her hair was still wet, so he could feel the warmth of his hands evaporate into her skin. He shuddered, thinking about how close he'd come to her.

"Get a hold of yourself." He murmured under his breath and lay back down on the couch. It was only 20 feet to her room, probably 26 to her bed, and her. He could just stand up and walk into her room, lean her over her bed, and …. "No!" he sat up, nearly sweating, his heart was racing. He was definitely in trouble. He knew he had to leave, regardless of formalities, if he stayed any longer; he would definitely become the kind of monster that you don't come back from.

She was sure that she'd heard him say something, beyond the door. And she was drawn in by fascination, and sheer curiosity. What had he said, who was he talking to? But with her hand on the cool metal of the doorknob, ready to barge back into the living room, she stopped. Winry knew she didn't really need to go and check on him. He wasn't a child. There was only one reason that she wanted to go back out there, in the light of the new morning, so she turned instead and retreated back to her bed, and the nightmares that promise to come in the light of a new day, alone.

Roy knew he should have slept, but the fatigue that he felt wasn't from lack of sleep as much as it was the complete emotional devastation that he felt. The previous night, clutching onto another person, hanging on for sanity and tentative forgiveness was the hardest he could remember in a long time. There was a quiet whimper from beyond Winry's door for the second time in only a few minutes. He folded his arms across his chest and refused to be lured into her room, yet again. It was clear; however that she was having a bad dream. But considering her life, it wasn't surprising that she had nightmares, after all, he still had them almost every night. He would wake up sweating, panting, desperately reaching out in his sleep, and calling to Full Metal prodigy to stay.

Another cry, a little louder this time promoted him to stand. Tentatively he approached the ominous door at the end of the hall, and slid his ear against it. There was the unmistakable sound of someone lost in the frightening world of their own nightmares. It really wasn't fair that after she'd been through so much in her life, she was forced to relive it all over and over again in her sleep.

"Ed." her whispered, breathy voice came from the other side of the door again. He closed his eye and leaned his head against the door. He knew he shouldn't, he knew it was none of his business, but even more important than all the useless stipulations he'd put in place for himself when he was around her in the last half hour, he would not let her just suffer alone. The least he could do was save her from the haunting memories that he'd given her. His hand on the doorknob, it twisted silently and without fail, granting him access to her bedroom. He was relieved to see her fully dressed now, wrapped in the white sheets.

She moved from a fetal position facing him to turn the other way. Her restlessness was all too apparent. He cautiously approached as she squeezed the pillow to her left tighter. She was in the middle of the bed, and that simple position stuck him with an awkward loneliness that he was sure was reflected in the single indented left in the middle of his own bed. He gently lifted his leg to kneel on the bed, leaning over her. But instead of the grimacing, painful expression he expected to see, he was granted with the twisted features of pleasure than he'd seen on many women's face in his arms.

She moaned then, and he was sure that he'd misunderstood the situation, entirely. Quickly he replayed the sounds he'd heard: whimpers, a light cry, Ed's name in a husky voice. Yes, he had completely missed what was happening. She was, in fact in the middle of a steamy dream. He wasn't sure then, but if he were a betting man he would have insisted that there was an unmistakable rosy hue to his cheeks in the morning sun. Carefully, he began to ease back off the bed, because as curious as he was, he knew that if she woke up with him in her bed with him – he would most likely be rewarded with a wrench to his head.

"Tisha…" she mused in her sleep, and he instantly froze. Had she woken up? Peering over her shoulder, she was obviously still asleep. But the hushed whisper of his former title tumbling from her parted, pink lips was almost enough to make him abandon his previous promise for holding his principles intact. Just what in the world was she dreaming about? She had undoubtedly said Fullmetal's name earlier, and now with the addition of what he could only assume to be his own name to the mix, it conjured up a terribly appealing scenario that he didn't wish to dwell on. He only crept farther from her, towards the edge of the bed.

He knew he shouldn't have gone into her room, crawled on her bed, and then heard her private fantasy from stunningly perfect lips, and a face so beautifully flawed that it made his insides twist into an uncomfortable shape that he was sure resembled a pretzel. She was undoubtedly going to be his downfall. What was her power over him, he wondered? Was it because she was broken like he was, or was it because she was perfectly damaged that drew him to her? He was, after all, just as damaged as she was. Was it the age difference, the blond hair, or was it something else entirely. Was he so reproachable that he actually craved her because his own conscience insisted that she was off limits? He couldn't be sure, but of all the possibilities, he was sure that he needed to leave.

Gracefully, for a man with a limp, a missing eye, and a headache that threatened to topple him over at any moment, he retreated from her form and all the sweet, forbidden promises her equally imaginative mind held for him. A begrudging sigh of relief swept over him as he was stopped just short of dismounting her bed when a slender, delicate hand wrapped around his wrist. He didn't' wish to dwell on the idea that he wanted her to stop him.

She turned to look at him, for what seemed like the hundredth time that day, with a look of sheer vulnerability and cracked desire that sent chills shooting over his body. It was then that he let his mind form the single thought that devastated his fragile sense of decency that had been ebbing in his mind for the past several hours manifest and take shape in the deep recesses of his cloudy mind. He wanted her. He didn't want to admit it, he didn't want to think it, he didn't want to consider the possibility that he was powerless against the intense need to be so close to another person that you can feel their heartbeat against your chest, match their heavy breathing in tandem, and feel every inch of their heated skin against your own unquenchable want. It had been too long since he'd experienced a longing this great that it fogged his judgment and forced the proud alchemist to lean forward toward her heavy lidded eyes.

She parted her lips, and sleepily let the words dribble from her inner thoughts in a haze of feigned sleep-induced delusion. She was, in fact, well aware of the fact that the man in her bed was real flesh and blood the likes of which she had never dreamt of before. She spoke, low and steady. But it was with devastating ignorance that it took him so long to piece together the words she spoke. It was a puzzle that he had to figure out, while the pounding of his heart thundered in his ears, and the acute sensation of her warm hand clasped around his wrist paralyzed him in place.

"I want you." Then with a speed and violent want that scared both of them, he found himself straddling her tiny frame, hands twisted in her hair, hovering his lips inches above hers. That simple admission of her desires drove down the last remaining barrier of self-control he'd managed to create. But he hesitated, unmoving in his achingly close stance towering over her imagination and desire. She looked up at him, heavy eyes, confused at the sudden lack of movement. His sheer proximity to her trembling, quaking lips was enough to drive her insane.

"Please…" she pleaded with him, for what, she wasn't exactly sure. All she knew, all she felt, saw, smelled was him: his hair, his eye, the marred skin of the patch-less face that haunted her in her dream. She could feel his breathing on her face and the heat that gathered between her legs as he hovered dangerously close her body. His hesitation seemed to melt away with her whispered supplication.

It was all almost too much to take. Her lips, her skin, her warm breath, the smell of roses, soft bedding, heaving breasts, her body grazing lighting over his groin under him, her quiet begging and the fiery want present in her eyes. He was nearly insane with restraint, frightened of the depth of his need and fear of her power over him.

It was her nimble fingers slowly entwining in his hair that gave him a brief reprieve from the force of his yearning. But it was only for a second, as he realized with disturbing absolution what she was doing. Gently she eased his head down, painfully slow and perfectly drawn into an ache that he could feel in his heart. He couldn't fight it anymore, he didn't want to. And with that single thought slipping away, he could feel soft, supple lips brushing against his own. He drew in breath frantically and pulled her head from the pillow into an almost painful kiss.

He crushed their faces together with an unknown desire to merge his body with hers. She wasn't nearly close enough. As his hips pressed against hers, her mouth opened in a tortured moan. He took this chance to taste her. His tongue slipped into her mouth and she was suddenly aware that she'd never kissed a man before. Not like this, not with tongues clashing and bodies moving in rhythm with some unknown beat. She gave up all power to him. She let his tongue guide hers and slide into the recesses of her mouth as she did his.

His hands left her hair, not without a few desperate movements to untangle his fingers from her golden locks. She was lost in a world where the only things that existed were him, her, and her bed. She balled the sheets in her fingers as his hands reached the aching peaks of her breasts. His large, deadly hands grabbed hold of her ample breasts and twisted her nipples through the fabric of her shirt.

His mouth left hers, leaving her feeling cold and wanting. But it was replaced by the burning of his mouth on her neck and ear, whispering yearnings to be nearer to her. "Closer…" he breathed in slowly, and attached his lips to her neck, gently grazing his teeth over her skin. "…I want to be closer to you." He desperately grasped her clothes, trying to hold himself back from tearing her shirt off.

"I want to feel you against me." She admitted with only a vague concept of what that would mean. But at this point, Winry was beyond caring about things like modesty and inexperience. All she knew was his touch, and all she wanted was to feel him inside of her. She was suddenly frantic to remove her clothes. She wanted to feel his hands on her skin, touching her without the impediments of clothing hindering the experience.

Together, they ripped at her small shirt and she wildly wiggle free of her shorts. Roy's hands helping unbutton them and slide them over the smooth skin of her legs and reveling in the shivers left in his wake. On his way back, he let his lips wash across her leg in the absence of her shorts. He looked up at her, smoky eye blazing with an unspoken desire to claim her body as his.

He stopped then, to kneel once again above her. His shaking fingers trying desperately to unbutton his blue uniform. While she watched him, she titled her head to the left and propped herself up on her elbows. She lifted an eyebrow at him suggestively. "Want some help." She offered with a hint of a smile playing in her swollen lips.

He smiled then, a genuine smile free of condescension and arrogance. She leaned forward, feeling his body rub against hers in an almost painful way. But she smiled too, thinking that she couldn't remember a smile quite as beautiful as his; even with the scar that covered his face. It struck her as unusual as her hands helped him out of his jacket and shirt, that he could be so perfectly damaged.

Tremblingly, she let her hands glide over the tight skin of his chest, slightly taken back by the number of scars that covered his pale skin. His large hand took hers as she stared, fixated on the long, jagged scar that started from just under his left shoulder and extended downward to just over his heart. She looked up at him, seeking permission to touch the reminder of his past. Wordlessly, he brought her hand to touch the hard flesh with soft fingers. From there, she let her hands wander across his broad chest, down his ribbed abdomen, and around his waist to run over the smooth skin of his flexed back.

"Perfectly damaged." She commented blindly as she closed her eyes and let her hands feel all the battles his body had lived through. When she opened her eyes, she was amazed to see his one eye focused directly at her. There was something that passed through his eye, almost like amazement. She couldn't be sure, but it made her want to touch his face.

Slowly, she cupped her hands around his face, noting the stubble that was still present, and the warmth of his face. She moved her hands up, lacing in his hair. He closed his eye and leaned into her touch. Then, feeling bolder, she let her right hand break away from his hair and lightly pass over his permanently closed eyelid. He shuttered slightly, but didn't pull away. She ran her thumb over the bubbled flesh, tracing where his eye should have been. Then, just to prove her point, she leaned up and placed a soft kiss on the skin of his face.

He opened his eye when he felt her breath on his face. He found her lips resting lightly against his disfigured skin. She eased back and looked directly into his good eye. "You're still beautiful." His hands found his way to her neck, soaking in the smooth texture of her flawless skin. He might have loved her just then, but he wasn't sure.

His lips once again came crashing down to hers, but this time there wasn't that frightening need. This time it was more of a dull ache in his heart that cried out to be lulled in her arms. She abided his touch, folding herself into his arms and his skilled hands went to work unclasping her bra. As the useless fabric drifted away from her skin, it was replaced by his large hands, enveloping her nubile breasts.

Her head rolled back and met with her pillow with a satisfying puff of air. She closed her eyes and revealed in the bitter chill of his bare hands kneading and massaging her breasts. She moaned, clearly enthralled by the proceedings of his ministrations. Soon his hands were joined by moist lips as her neck was suddenly left bare, sore, and bruised. Her hips bucked up as his teeth grazed over her pert nipple and she might have let out a small cry, she wasn't sure anymore. All she knew was that he was still wearing his pants, and she didn't know why.

"Roy." She breathed heavily and relished in the feel of his name on her lips. He stopped for a moment, and she almost panicked, until she realized she'd spoken. He watched her expectantly. "Take off your pants." She ordered in an almost authoritative tone. It didn't take a second glance to convince him. He pulled away from her body and she whimpered. But he was gone only long enough to remove his clothes and then he was back. Bare skin rubbed together in a frenzied dance for completion.

She gasped as his strained erection came up against her thigh, and stroked fiercely against her wet underwear. There seemed to be a change in the smell of the bedroom them. Almost as if her lust for him saturated the air around them and she began to feel dizzy. It was all too much, so fast. His skin, his lips, his eye, and exposed erection were driving her crazy. She wanted him. She wanted to taste him, to feel him in her hands.

She blindly reached out between their bodies, surprised at her own tenacity. She took hold of his warm, hard shaft and smiled widely as he hissed and let his face fall in between her breasts. Satisfied, even with her inexperience, she was desperate to fill the aching hole that settled in between her legs. "Onegai." Again she formed the only thought she knew how to express. She pleaded for him to take her.

He didn't require any more of an invitation than the desperate pleading in her dark eyes and the request falling from her lips. He ripped at the offending material that separated him from her with a frantic kind of desire that filled his eye. Her useless underwear ripped from her hips and flew into the distant sunlight. He spared one last look into her glistening blue eyes before he took and breathe and pushed forward.

Her hands fisted the sheets as he filled her and she screamed in a feral, desperate way that made it even harder to steady his nerves. It had been so long since he'd felt the inside of a woman. He hissed and bit down on his bottom lip. He could feel the tearing of skin as he'd pushed in. It wasn't surprising. But it only made his raspy breaths come harder and more frantic than before. He was so close, but he'd only just begun.

He looked down at her, eyes clenched shut, her chest heaved up and down and he was captivated by the sight of her perfect body stretched out under him and around him. He waited for her to resurface and open her eyes. It only took a moment, but when she did finally give him a half-lidded, dark expression, his heart ached and he groaned. "Ready?" It wasn't really a question, not anymore. It was a warning.

He was in her, and between her and on her. She could feel his heartbeat in his quivering arms that held his body from hers. She reached, wildly willing him to move, to stop this itch that crawled between her legs and tortured her senses. She needed something, she wasn't exactly sure what it was that she was so desperate for, but she knew that only he could give it to her now. And he had to move!

She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him to her. A heated kiss distracted him just long enough for her to thrust her hips up. A sleek profanity slipped from his lips and she smiled, wickedly pleased. His body fell to cover hers completely now, and she took this opportunity to adjust to a more comfortable position. Her legs were spread across the bed, and it was… incomplete. So she wrapped her thighs around his hips and moaned deep in her throat as the action brought him farther inside her core. "Much better."

She though she heard him laugh then, a low little chuckle against the skin of her shoulder. But she wasn't really sure because in the next second, there was movement. His hips retreated, pulling the ridges of him along ever inch of her insides. She shivered and savored the sensation of it. He stopped just short of exiting her, only to change directions and proceed to slowly fill her once more. It was torture, and with every moan, and hiss he seemed more pleased. But it wasn't enough. She needed something else. "Harder." Her voice seemed to come out of no where. But if the dark shade his eye took in that instant was any kind of indication, she's just done a very good thing indeed.

He looked down, through the curtain of his hair as she pleaded for him. He couldn't hold back anymore. He could feel the pressure build in him as her tight center pulled in so deep he thought he might be lost forever. So he complied, and gave her what she wanted. He bucked his hips to rock against the bone of her pelvis and reveled in the sound of her scream his name. He knew he wouldn't last much longer, and he so wanted to hear her come for him.

"Don't move." His voice was thick, and dangerous. It was an order she was going to obey, and she knew it. So she did as she was told, and stilled her arching back and moving pelvis. She lay flat, desperately curling her toes and trying to see past the blinding light that was growing. Her legs were crossed just over the curve of his butt and as she lay still for him to ravage, she was stuck with the insane desire to dig her nails into something.

Her hands reached his back and she ran her nails over the center of his spine. Another profanity slipped, and she was pleased. She dug her nails into his shoulder on one side and bit the other. Another profanity, much harsher this time, and she was even more pleased. She whispered his name in his ear and asked him to make her come. Abruptly he pulled away and looked down at her with that same dangerous expression.

She was going to make him lose it. He wouldn't last more than a few more moments and he was determined to oblige her request. He pulled out and dropped to his knees at her feet. She looked confused; he liked that expression, particularly because he knew she was going to like what came next. He tilted his head and immediately brushed the tip of his tongue over the dripping line of her slit.

He placed one hand on her stomach, and used the other to dip in while he swirled his tongue over the enticing folds between her legs. As expected, her hips jerked under his grip and he smiled widely against her skin. He added another finger, more tongue. She screamed again, and he waited for her to come. One more finger and he rotated his hand. She screamed a profanity and coated his fingers in wet, slick satisfaction.

Everything had gone from heated and fast, to very, very slow and bright. His fingers in her, his tongue doing… something; it was all too much, and exactly what she had been aching for. She couldn't even move in the wake of the spasms that rocked her core and plunged downward. Once her legs stopped twitching, she found him wiping his hands on her sheets, looking deliriously happy.

She waited one more minute for her vision to clear before she propped herself up on her elbow and gently swirled her own nipple with the other hand. "What about you?" she was being seductive, and somewhere, deep in the back of her 15 year old mind; she insisted that she didn't even know how to be seductive. But realistically, in her nearly 20 year-old body, she twisted her nipple and traced a winding path between her legs and let her finger dip inside herself. There was still an ache, a need, a hunger that had yet to be filled. And she knew that it would be found when he came in her.

He couldn't believe what he was seeing. Her fingers tangled in the dark tresses that obscured his view. His own, previously neglected need was now back and pounding every inch of his body with the unquenchable desire to find completion in her. As soon as she withdrew her hand, it was replaced with the one member of his body that had complete control at the moment. She was still so tight around him; he could almost feel her heartbeat.

He groaned her name and ground in and out in a frantic race for ecstasy. She muttered something into the sweat-sheen skin of his chest, but he couldn't hear it. He thought it might have been his name; he liked to think it was. So he moaned hers, deep into her hair, the side of her neck, the soft pout of her lips, the taunt skin of her breasts, the curve of her ear. He showered her with her own name and all his pent-up sexual desires.

He hadn't realized how much he missed this, how much he needed this. But he knew that it wouldn't have been like this if it wasn't her. She forgave him, held him, touched him, and accepted him. She collected his grief, and pain. She knew his deepest secret and shared his broken moments. She pulled him to her and said his name like it was hers to moan. He knew that he'd never want to be connected, so engrained to another person for the rest of his life; because in the most uncharacteristic ways, she completed his fragmented soul.

Then he fell, spilling into her and thanking god for every inch of her perfect body. He was vaguely aware that she followed again, just after. But in that moment, he could feel the burning in his eyes and the connection that held him to her. He chanced a quick glance at her, only to find the most serene, peaceful expression he'd ever seen. He was sure his face echoed the same kind of tranquility.

She watched his face curve into the most delightful grin she'd ever seen, and something clenched in her chest. She wondered it how long he would stay. But she couldn't ask, not now. Instead, he separated from her, leaving her cold and singular once again. But his hands on her waist, pulling her back to his chest was fulfilling in a completely new kind of way. She didn't dare speak, for fear of breaking the fragile haven their act had just created in her lonely little apartment bedroom.

He held her and waited for his breathing to return to normal. He wondered how long she'd let him stay, be he knew now wasn't the right time to ask. Instead, he settles for pulling her flush against his body and burring his face deep in her blond hair. He breathed her in and waited for the sleep that edged at the corners of his mind. He didn't know how long this would last, but just knowing that when he woke it would be with her was enough, for now. Everything else just faded into the background of supplemental information. There was only one last though that gripped at his mind as he let his eye shut and falls back into oblivion.

Ed would be so pissed off if he knew…

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ZZZZZZZZZZ END!

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